Ambanis among top four Indians in ‘World’s Richest’ club (Lead)

By Arun Kumar Washington, March 11 (IANS) Mukesh and Anil Ambani, steel czar Lakshmi Mittal and K.P. Singh, now the richest real estate baron, have been named by Forbes as the four Indians among the world’s top 10 richest people.

The announcement saw Warren Buffett dethrone Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates as the world’s richest man. Gates had held the slot for 13 straight years.

Mittal, heading the world’s largest steelmaker ArcelorMittal, is in the fourth place globally with a personal fortune of $45 billion. A long-time resident of London, he is also Europe’s richest resident, notes the US business magazine.

“Adani is a college dropout who spurned his father’s textile trading business to seek his own fortune. Today he is Asia’s richest newcomer thanks to two big public holdings, Adani Enterprises, and Mundra Port, one of India’s first private-sector ports,” it says.

“India’s youngest self-made billionaire, Gehlaut” is an engineer from the elite Indian Institute of Technology-Delhi.

He started online brokerage Indiabulls with two college friends in 1999. He still heads the company and is its largest shareholder.

A few young tycoons were able to make money this past year in the face of financial turmoil, Forbes said.

Among them Indian pharmaceutical kings Malvinder and Shivinder Singh added $100 million to their combined net worth.

Declaring Buffett the richest man on the planet, Forbes said: “Riding the surging price of Berkshire Hathaway stock, America’s most beloved investor has seen his fortune swell to an estimated $62 billion, up $10 billion from a year ago.”

That massive pile of scratch puts him ahead of Gates, who is now worth $58 billion and is ranked third in the world after Mexican telecom tycoon Carlos Slim Hel, with an estimated net worth of $60 billion.